I’ve started a blog explaining my disappearance a million times. I find myself getting irritated and walking away. In fact, I just listened to the podcast of the service that made me leave and I’m angry all over again… Apparently, everything I ever do will be out of selfish ambitions (Nearly verbatim what the pastor said.) According to him, I am incapable of true love because I don’t believe in God.
It’s one thing to say you shouldn’t love “this way” (Same-sex marriage) and a completely different thing to say you aren’t “capable” of truly loving anything. According to that service my love for my son has a selfish ulterior motive, my love for my husband has a selfish ulterior motive, my love for the rest of my family and friends has a selfish ulterior motive… Heck, there’s some warped selfish ulterior motive to loving my dogs (Maybe it’s the urine pedicure my not-house-broken dog treats me to in the morning).After all of the incredible people I met, a statement like that really makes a person step back and think… All the smiles, the friendliness, the welcoming, the acceptance – Was it all an act? Are they all just being fake? I’d say I loved going, but ya know, the pastor says I’m not capable of it (Can you read the irritation in that?) After that service I left just feeling like I had been conned. It was an uncalled for statement/tangent. It was self-aggrandizing. And quite frankly, I haven’t been able to find one other Christian person that stood behind that statement.

On to checking out Royal Rangers and Awana in hopes that they’re a little more humble.

We had a guest speaker this week, a Pastor nicknamed “The Dark Shepard.” He said when he was a kid he wanted to be a professional wrestler and that would’ve been his name. Now, he’s still going by that nickname, but he’s “drop kicking demons” with the word of Jesus instead.

So, the title of his sermon was Life Ain’t Fair. He said life isn’t fair because it’s so much better than death. He said you make more than 2,500 choices every day and you determine the quality of your life by those choices.

The Pastor quoted Deuteronomy 30:19-20 as his supporting verse for choosing life/the Lord.

This post won’t be long because I kind of internalized after his “announcement.” He said he was the victim of childhood sexual abuse. First, wow! The nerve (in a good way) to say that in front of a congregation of people as a victim is incredible! There’s so much stigma attached to being a victim of sexual abuse. It’s like you’re supposed to suffer in silence and no one can ever know it happened. Second, WOW! Men in general don’t speak up about being the victim of sexual abuse. It’s not “manly” to be a victim, much less “manly” to be the victim of sexual abuse. So, really, kudos to the Pastor for sharing that.

He said he was depressed for a long time until a point came in his life where he turned to God/Jesus for his happiness and chose life.

I cannot relate to a single syllable of that! I was the victim of childhood sexual abuse. I didn’t get relief when he died. I had hoped for it so hard! It happened, three days before it would’ve been a year since it happened. He died of a heart attack on the way to the hospital. After that, took me a decade to confront my dad for having knowingly left me in the house of a pedophile. I didn’t talk to him at all for five of those years and to this day, there’s never been a more awkward moment for me than when I say “I love you,” when I get off the phone with him. My granddad is the reason I have so few friends I would actually fall back on should I ever reach for help. He was my “person” and he violated everything about that relationship. I engaged in self-harm for a long time. I had lost my person, I didn’t have anyone to confide in. No one to grieve losing my childhood innocence with. Around the same time I confronted my dad, I stopped self-harming. I was ready to face it all and I had found my “people” to do it with.

How do you have some epiphany and you’re all healed from it?! The Pastor didn’t claim everything was better over night, but it was on it’s way. It took me a long time. Even then, when I spoke to my dad about it, I think there’s only ever been one other time when it’s been so satisfying to hear someone cry. To know that they’re hurting. It was satisfying to the core of my being! I’m unapologetic about that.

Fourteen years later, I’m not angry anymore. I don’t want to hear, nor make, anyone involved cry. I feel like I’ve moved on from it, but a Godly intervention never came for me. It was a life lesson. It was just one stepping stone in learning to read through people.

So, yeah. I really derailed after he dropped that bit of information. I lost the spiritual message.

*You can thank the Associate Pastor for mentioning a zombie apocalypse survival guide for the title*

Indeed, the title of this service was “Survival Guide.” In the Associate Pastor’s Amazon search for survival guides he found: Zombie apocalypse survival guides, short term & long term wilderness survival guides, 101 hiding places (A survival guide for hide and seek?), and parenting. The CDC joined in on the whole zombie obsession and created a disaster preparedness page using the threat of an impending zombie apocalypse. http://www.cdc.gov/phpr/zombies.htm

Of course, the service didn’t focus on any of the topics mentioned above. It focused on spiritual survival. It focused on giving you a list of things to remember when you’re trying to stay on the right path.

The list included:

Remember your friends

As far as faith goes, the Pastor said that God works through relationships, the best example I can recall is that every person living is a product of a relationship! God used your parents to bring you into this world. So, when you’re struggling, you should fall back on those relationships, God put them in your life for a reason. Isolation from your friends and support systems allows your fears to grow and warp.

I’m truly torn on the subject of friendship. There are friends and then there are friends. I know how stupid that sounds, but it’s how I see it. We can be friendly, hang out, the typical stuff friends do. Then there are friends. You can be next door neighbors or live hundreds of miles apart and they’re your rock! My “fall back” people would probably be limited to my husband, a friend I’ve known for 13 years, and my in-laws. In the end though, I’m one of those “tough it out on my own” type people. I don’t like to rely on anyone else for support. I acknowledge that’s a defense mechanism, but I’m not ready to remedy that.

Remember your focus

I thought the Pastor’s example for this was rather funny: A case of miscommunication about directions led to him and his wife bickering on their honeymoon. He said it got to the point where she was questioning his leadership abilities and he was questioning her submissive wife abilities. During all of this arguing, he noticed two toucans in the trees and declared that he couldn’t even enjoy them because he so angry! They had forgotten the focus of their honeymoon, to enjoy each other’s company.

Remember your name

I think I can identify with this the least. My name means “appearance of God.” How ironic. Oddly enough, my son’s name has a Godly definition, too. I’d tell you, but I Googled it and it was the first result! But seriously! How does that happen? I completely lack the ability to harbor faith and yet I was given a name meaning appearance of God?!

Please note that the following is not a condescending view on your belief and faith, but simply how I process things.

This service referenced 1 Kings 19: The main character in this story was Elijah. He prayed and God immediately answered him by lighting an alter on fire. Elijah continued to pray and a drought ended. Elijah later runs off to hide from the queen and God speaks directly to Elijah. Admittedly, such direct communication/contact doesn’t take faith to believe, but what I don’t understand is how people maintain faith in present day without ever having such a direct connection with God. That’s where I disconnect. I could believe if I had an interaction like that, I wouldn’t be left with much choice. The Bible is full of stories of people being commanded to do things and speaking with God directly. Yet, in today’s time, that doesn’t happen.

Also, Happy belated Mother’s Day! The service started out with parent and child dedications. I really don’t mean any offense, but it certainly was unnerving for me. I understand the premise of it. It wasn’t the intentions behind it that bothered me, but the actions to do it… The Pastor mentioned “laying hands” and asked everyone in attendance to reach out to the families as they were prayed over. Laying hands… It brought me back to my first time going and I wondered if one of the parents would start convulsing when the Pastor touched them. I really need to work on internalizing that this isn’t that sort of church, but when I hear “laying hands,” that’s the image that comes to mind. Barring my convoluted vision of what could happen, it was rather nice. It was a really nice thing for the church to offer for Mother’s Day.

Following the serious spiritual start of the service, the Pastor presented us with mom themed memes! I was happy to see my favorite among them!

When my son was younger, this couldn’t have been more true. I think now it’s more along the lines of “I took a shower and didn’t rip out all of my hair.” He’s at an age where his questions never end and they’re seemingly always about what we’re going to do tomorrow, or for his next birthday, or next Halloween, or next Christmas… It’s never later today. I try to answer him, but I haven’t scheduled things out that far!

Ok, not all of service was dedicated to Mother’s Day, the Pastor did give a sermon! It was based on Philippians 2:1-11. He started, at least as far as my notes say (I don’t know what’s going on with the podcasts, but they’re not available for me to refer back to,) with Philippians 2:3-4 – Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too.

I am selfish. I admit it. Especially with food and money. I’m not entirely sure why I feel so aggressively possessive of my food, but I am. I irrationally angry when someone wants “a bite” or “a couple fries.” I got as much food as I wanted, not as much as I wanted and a few extra bites for you! My issues surrounding money developed when I was with my ex-husband. I had to hide my money or he’d take it and spend it on beer and strippers. Unfortunately, the urge to hide it and claim it as mine has lingered throughout the years. I want to work on it. I occasionally offer to share food, but it’s definitely a slow work in progress.

Trying to impress others… No, I can’t see myself doing that. I don’t like other people enough to try and impress them. Maybe impress upon them a need to give me space. Attempting to impress others is a losing battle. You won’t win! You’ll impress one person while other people will call you a fool. ALWAYS be the outcome. So, if you’re Christian, you’ve got a book that lays out exactly how you can impress the single-most important being in your life. If you’re like me and don’t believe, impress the person looking back at you in the mirror.

Don’t be Kanye… I mean, be humble. Kanye is the antonym of humble! No one likes him. I don’t know if I’m humble, I don’t think I’ve ever really thought about it. Maybe I’ll ask people if they think I’m humble and we can revisit this! In general though, no one likes a narcissist. You’re not infallible, don’t try to convince people otherwise.

Here is where it got funny!!! I never thought I’d ever hear an example quite like this in a church! Taking an interest in others, too! Farting on a plane was the Pastor’s example! He admitted he understands why people fart on planes, the intestinal discomfort and what not, but then something atrocious happens… That smelly fart gets recycled through the air vents in the plane the rest of the flight! He said he wouldn’t expect anyone to ride out the entire flight in agony to keep it in, he’d simply ask that you go do it in the bathroom (He specified the bathroom at the rear of the plane because it’s less likely to have a line.)

Taking an interest in others is a hard one for me. To be quite honest, I typically don’t. It actually started on a plane for me! I breastfed my son for 14 months. I did it however I was comfortable (With a blanket, without a blanket, “flop it out”, layered shirts, etc.). When my son was 10 months old I flew from New York to Florida. In attempt to think of the comfort of other passengers on the plain, I bought two small bottles of apple juice (The kind in the itty bitty bottles that you can attach a bottle nipple to.) I didn’t know if the seats around us would be booked or not and I didn’t want to turn the person seated next to me tomato red when I fed my son. TSA made me throw away the sealed bottles of apple juice! I didn’t want to give my son apple juice with all the nasty additives! I didn’t want to spend money on garbage when I produced enough to feed quintuplets! No, I did it because I was being considerate of whomever might have been seated next to us and TSA made me throw away my attempt. Ever since then, I do what suits me. If the people around me are comfortable with it, cool. If not, I’m not forcing you to be in my company. I know that sounds stupid and petty, but if you knew how much of a breastfeeding nut I am, you’d understand why that one moment sticks out so much.

Now then! This post is nearly two weeks late, it’s after 1am, and my notes kind of dwindled after the airplane farting reference. Hint, hint: I’m about to work on my post from the following week. Let’s see how much I ramble!

Total side note: I think I’m going to specifically aim to put up a post on Mondays instead of Sundays. It’ll give me more time to reflect on the service and listen to the podcast of it if need be. Not to mention, I’ve been late getting it up the last couple weeks. It just feels rushed trying to get it up on Sundays.

Now a church related side note: The church was able to donate $5,000 to disaster relief in Nepal! This goes back to the first evening meeting I wrote about and the margins the church runs within. They didn’t need to do a fundraiser or wait for enough money to be donated. The Pastor contacted a missionary he knows that is in Nepal, asked what they needed and cut the check! I think it’s extraordinary that people have given so much to the church that they’re able to do participate in all of the organizations they’re involved with, support the church’s staff and events, drop $5,000 for disaster relief, and I’m fairly certain they’re still capable of giving if someone comes up in need! Generous hearts that attend the church and a wise money-management plan has set this church up for greatness.

Service!

The Pastor continued the series on being weird. I have to admit, I was kind of dreading this service. He had mentioned that this one was going to be about “sexual impurities” (Not his words, but you get the gist.) I knew that would include two hot-button topics for me: Homosexuality and abstinence. I support all things gay related… Gay marriage, adoption, just being gay… All of it. It doesn’t personally affect me, I’m not gay. Gay people getting married doesn’t negate the validity of my marriage and by all rationale, my marriage would be just as unholy (2 Corinthians 6:14-18 says so.) If single parents can make up for their missing partner, then two of one gender can partner to raise children too.

To my surprise! The Pastor didn’t dwell on homosexuality. He mentioned it and moved on. I was surprised because when I was younger, I went to Ybor City a lot. The “curbside preachers” all had their best imitation of Westboro Baptist Church’s signs condemning gay people. The typical “Adam and Eve not Adam and Steve.” They were nasty people. They came out with their bullhorns to yell at people and condemn them all to hell. It’s the lack of condemnation that surprised me! The Pastor’s tone is “This is a sin. You know it, I know it. It’s on you to see it and change your ways.”

The other part I was dreading, abstinence… Not so much the theory of abstinence, but I think preaching and teaching abstinence are two different things. Preach abstinence as the ideal coarse of action, but teach safe sex. That’s a big one for me, because I believe whenever we make things taboo, they become a million times more desirable to those we’re trying to ward away from it.

Otherwise, I’m pretty onboard with what he was saying! He offered some examples of how people wind up sinning. Some “normal” thought processes that make it easier.

Everyone looks: Yep, a lot of people do. The Pastor noted that men look for physical things and women look for emotional things. Statistics back him up! I’ve always found that odd. I don’t believe in cheating. As soon as the thought to look elsewhere hits you, I think you should own it and see what needs to be fixed in your relationship. It’s such a downward spiral from there, that listing the other two “normal” thought processes separating doesn’t make sense to me. It goes from everyone looks, to I can’t help it, to at least I don’t act on it… And then you’re acting on it. All that looking and fantasizing about someone you think would be better (i.e. Prettier, more emotionally available, more financially stable…) when you should’ve realized something needed to be fixed when that “greener pasture” first caught your attention.

It seems like “everyone looks” for something better when it comes to everything. A better car, a better house, a better job, a better spouse, and a better lawn. Funny thing about always looking to “greener pastures,” sometimes it’s just green spray paint. I talked to a friend about this “greener pastures” thing and she nearly blew my eardrum laughing! Her and her husband had been admiring a neighbor’s lawn. It’s always perfectly manicured and a brilliant green. Well, one day she was driving by when he was outside working on his yard. She stopped to ask him what he did to make his yard look so vibrant. His answer… The stuff he was sprinkling on the yard actually has green dye in it and he puts it on the grass when it’s about to rain so it soaks in and dyes the grass! Not to brag or anything, but I’ve got a pretty awesome friend and even though her and her husband are going up against a “cheater,” they’re working on their lawn the hard way. They’re going to make it truly healthy!

The Pastor found a startling statistic: 60% of people will commit adultery by the age of 40… So when you’re 40 and hanging out with your 40 year old friends, three out of five of them will have cheated on their spouse! 100% of those people started out just looking, because everyone looks…

Excuses, excuses, I know! I figured I’d offer an explanation for why I haven’t put up my blog from last Sunday, it’s still sitting in my drafts.

WARNING this post will contain information many may deem as too much information. I’ve mentioned being an “open book” in the past and this post will undoubtedly prove my point. It will not contain graphic images, it’s not a “NSFW” post! It’ll simply be a little more than you probably wanted to know about me.

Onward! So, I’ve talked about arts and crafts that I’m into and I’m pretty sure I’ve touched on the way that crafts plague my life. Well, this week has been an excellent example of it! Once I get an idea of something to make, I can’t stop thinking about it until I’ve done it… Thinking is an understatement, obsessing is more accurate. I get scatter-brained, I can’t sleep, I feel aimless. It’s horrible! I’ve had to take sleep aides to get some sleep when stuck in the cycle of obsession! I tried multiple times to sit down and type out my blog for last Sunday. I’d type, delete it all, type it another way and delete it again. I ended up going to JoAnn’s for the supplies to make what’s in my head instead of finishing the blog post. I simply couldn’t do it!

I’ve stayed up until 4am carving or crocheted until my vision blurred. It’s not uncommon with crafts like carving, crocheting, or knitting that the reason I stopped and didn’t pick it back up for a couple days was because my hands were blistered and so sore I could wield the needed tools. I started sewing on Monday this week. I’ve sewn everyday so far, including this morning. My neck and shoulders are screaming for a break, but I have 12 more things cut out and ready to be sewn! I can’t stop now!

I think the only saving grace of my obsession is that I’m good at it. The achilles heel of making it profitable, I can only make things based off of what pops into my head. I can’t muster the motivation to create someone else’s idea. The only time I’ve sold something I made was a monkey I crocheted. It sat in the house for a few months, I showed a couple friends and one of them happened to want it.

The monkey I made and sold

Now, my obsessive nature doesn’t stop with arts and crafts. I like to know things about everything. Not to say I’m a know-it-all, but if a topic piques my interest, all bets are off! I’ll be stuck researching it until I can’t find any new information on it. Hot topics I like to research off and on are medicine and law. I’m a huge medical dork! I should’ve gone to school to be a doctor, but I was too busy sleeping in high school to achieve any grades worth noting. A quick note on my blog’s Facebook page noted that I’m currently involving myself in the legal system. Pro-se is so overwhelming! It’s worth the savings! One lawyer told me his retainer is $3,500 and he’s $385/hr! To top off his outrageous pricing, he also flat out admitted to being inexperienced in the field of law I would’ve been using him for!

All of this culminates into my current project! (This is also the TMI part, if you’re looking to skip out on that!) RUMPS or reusable menstrual products. How many noses scrunched up at the thought of that? Let me ‘splain! So, this is inevitably going to end up being a sort of “lesson” on RUMPS and an explanation on how they came to my attention or became the object of my current obsession.

I was originally introduced to Soft Cups, they’re disposable menstrual cups and readily available at Walgreen’s (Some other stores too, but I don’t know which ones!) A friend told me how much less she cramped while using them. <- THAT was the spark that ignited my obsession! Of course, I went straight to the store and got some! Now I feel like I’ve been menstruating wrong for over a decade! From there I looked into reusable menstrual cups. If I’m dumping tampons, why not look for a way where I won’t have to buy another menstrual product for at least another decade? Ok, I got my hands on reusable menstrual cups… Now, I know every single lady reading this right now knows about leaks! All of you! If you’re denying it, you’re lying! I was determined to fully kick the menstrual product industry to the curb, including panty liners! Thus, I present to you, the panty liners I’ve been making this week! I am no longer contributing to a multi-billion dollar industry that isn’t really interested in the innovation of feminine hygiene products. Not to mention, no risk of TSS (You know you’ve read the tampon insert, everyone has when stranded in the bathroom with nothing to read!), saving about $120/yr (That doesn’t sound like much, but over the last 16 years, that’s nearly $2,000 I could’ve spent on something more worthwhile), and last, but certainly not least… Feminine hygiene product manufacturers use “trade secrets” as a means to not disclose what’s actually in their products. Look at your box of tampons or pads, it doesn’t tell you what it’s made of. I’m fairly disappointed in myself for having not noticed before, but it’s what I’ve known all this time. There wasn’t an alternative that I knew of. You check the ingredients in your food, your pet’s food, what materials your clothing is made out of, your hair products… But not something worn in such an intimate place? I’m not satisfied with not knowing, so I’ve made the switch.

So, now you know! I’m obsessed and can’t stop until I’ve finished the project.

So, I started a rough draft on paper for the first time. I was thinking about the service and was pretty convinced it followed the service from last Sunday pretty closely. The more I wrote and referenced my notes, the more I realized I was wrong. Now my paper rough draft is pretty much trash. I guess I do my best work on the fly!

By the way, I figured out I’ve been using the wrong terminology! He’s an Associate Pastor, not a Junior Pastor.

Okay, okay, the service!

Last week focused on why normal isn’t working and how what society perceives as weird is what we should be doing. Biblically speaking, it focused on society being on the wide road to destruction and those who are doing right, or what’s considered weird, are on a narrow path to life. (Matthew 7:13-14) This week focused on our interactions with those around us. Our desire for approval from others and their reactions tempting us away from the “narrow path.”

I believe it was one of the first things the Pastor said and I like it a lot: Stop living to please people. He referenced Proverbs 29:25 which says “Fearing people is a dangerous trap, but trusting the Lord means safety.” At least my Bible says that, I have a NLV Bible, there’s no thous and heretos. I stopped living to please other people a long time ago. By a long time I mean eight years ago. Well, in August it’ll be eight years. Funny how I can put an exact timestamp on when it happened. I suppose the story of how it happened is better left for another day to keep myself from going off on a tangent. Anywho! The Pastor had the perfect example for why you shouldn’t live to please people, follow what’s trending on Twitter. It changes so often, you’d barely be acceptable at doing whatever is trending before it changed to something else. Of course, you’ll also have to remember that for everything trending, there’s also a group of people who absolutely loathe whatever it is.

A couple personal examples of my inability to please everyone: Some Christians, upon finding out I don’t believe, like to tell me exactly where I’m going. Some Atheists, upon finding out I go to church and support my son’s faith, like to tell me I’m allowing people to brainwash my kid. I get it about how I raise my son in general, too. He has a bedtime, I don’t let him watch TV (Although he likes to go to friends’ houses to sneak in some TV,) I don’t let him go wherever he wants and he rarely eats candy (I sacrifice myself and eat 98% of his holiday candy.) My mother-in-law is great about it all! He has fun with her while still maintaining an acceptable weekend bedtime, he doesn’t watch disgusting cartoons (i.e. Uncle Grandpa, Adventure Time, SpongeBob,) and while she occasionally gives him candy, he primarily eats healthy food at her house. She thinks it’s great! He’s pretty well-behaved for an eight year old. My mother, that’s another story! She’d let him stay up until he dropped from exhaustion, watch TV until his eyeballs fell out of his head, and stuff himself with disgusting “food” until he looked like the blueberry girl from Willy Wonka if I let him visit her! She thinks I’m too strict, I should let her be the wild and fun, no rules grandma she wants to be. I’m okay with whomever might have a problem with the way I raise my son. You’re not the one who will stand up later on in life and claim the responsibility for having raised him. You’re not the person who will have to harbor the guilt and the what ifs if he grows up to be a bad person. I’m doing my best to raise a man who will positively impact the world around him and that’s all that matters.

I think a good question for people pleasers is: Why let others be the appraiser on the value of your life? They’re not living in your shoes, don’t let them set the bar for how comfortable it is to walk in them. If you believe, and as the Pastor said, you’re the one who will have to stand on judgement day and answer for the life you lived. Are you comfortable being judged for the things you’ve done to please other people? Even if you don’t believe, you’re the one who is going to have to lay down every night and go to sleep with the memories of what you’ve done. Can you sleep at night knowing what you’ve done to please other people?

Another thing he said was, “Don’t worry when people criticize you, worry when they don’t, because you’re fitting in too well.” That’s a powerful statement, I think you should take moment and read it again. It’s ok, I’ll wait……………………. Did you read it again? Let that sink in? Do you do things differently enough that people criticize you? I also don’t think it has to be taken literally, people don’t need to openly criticize you for it to apply. People will hide things they’re doing from you when they know you don’t agree with their idea of what’s acceptable. It’s passive aggressive criticism. Whether it’s open or passive aggressive, it’s ok. It could even be described as good. That means you’re doing something right that they aren’t willing to do. I think that’s the motive for the criticism: You’re accomplishing something they weren’t/aren’t willing to put in the effort to accomplish.

While I typically don’t fit in, it’s admittedly not always because of my “superior” moral code. I’ve shaved my head, I have lots of tattoos and piercings, and I’ve been known to have a foul mouth… The good I’ve done in this world outside of my family is pretty limited to giving what cash I can to the homeless and helping dogs as much as I can. I’d like to think I have a higher standard for how I think I and those around me should behave, but I couldn’t definitively tell you. I’m kind of a recluse. I don’t like people in general. I suppose I’m jaded, but I expect everyone to have an ulterior motive. I’d rather watch people than interact with them. I haven’t decided if I’m going to stray and post some kind of mid-week blog about me in particular or if I’ll simply elaborate on my “author’s page” to possibly address my lack of fondness for people.